March 28, Chicago - National Futures Association (NFA) announced today that it has permanently barred Integral Investment Management LP, a commodity pool operator (CPO) Member of NFA and Conrad P. Seghers, a principal and associated person of Integral Investment, from NFA membership and associate membership. The action was part of a settlement agreement reached on March 28, 2002, marking the culmination of months of investigative work by NFA and involving several state and federal regulators and enforcement agencies.

NFA alleged that Integral Investment and Seghers failed to produce credible evidence to support the performance claims on their web site, continuously gave evasive answers to questions about the performance of their hedge funds and the nature of the hedge funds' investments, failed to submit to a deposition, and otherwise failed to cooperate with NFA in its investigation. In accepting the settlement, Integral Investment and Seghers neither confirmed nor denied the allegations.

NFA began investigating Seghers' activities in late 2000, when NFA Compliance staff visited Seghers' Dallas office, acting on a customer complaint. Although Seghers' funds appeared to trade securities, not futures, NFA decided to review the account activity in several trading accounts which Seghers maintained for his funds at a major brokerage firm. The brokerage firm also hired an outside consultant to perform an independent review of the accounts. The review revealed large losses in the accounts-losses that were not reported by Seghers.

In October 2001, NFA presented the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) with evidence indicating that Seghers and Integral Investment had advertised false returns and furnished investors with false statements concerning the performance of the funds operated by Seghers and Integral Investment.

Approximately one month after NFA referred the Seghers case to the SEC, the Art Institute of Chicago filed suit in Texas charging Seghers and Integral Investment with
fraud in connection with a $40 million investment the Art Institute made in Seghers' hedge funds.

"NFA is proud to have played a key role in this investigation," says Dan Roth, NFA's senior executive vice-president. "By collaborating with other regulatory and enforcement agencies, we were able to uncover Mr. Seghers' fraudulent activity and take the necessary enforcement action."

NFA is a congressionally authorized self-regulatory organization for the U.S. futures industry. NFA provides a wide range of regulatory programs and services to ensure the integrity of the futures markets.

NFA is the premier independent provider of efficient and innovative regulatory programs that safeguard the integrity of the derivatives markets.